Because of the slowness of our court system, lawsuits have little chance of bringing any dramatic change.

"The number of cases which can be tried by Federal courts of administrative tribunals is small compared to the pervasive nature of employment discrimination," says a government pamphlet explaining the importance of the affirmative action program.

In the fiscal year 1972, the Equal Employment Commission received 38,840 complaints and expects 45,000 more this year. It now has a backlog of 53,410 cases, 43,101 of which are pending investigation.

Recognizing the potential of this new tool, groups representing women in the graduate school, at the medical area, as well as groups of secretaries, librarians have banded together to form "Women Employed at Harvard." One of their primary concerns will be affirmative action.

HEW has received objections to Harvard's latest affirmative action plan from "at least four women's groups," according to an official at HEW. Because of this input, HEW is likely to ask Harvard to revise its current plan.

Modest as Harvard's affirmative action goals may be, they have nevertheless provoked a considerable number of objections from male faculty and administrators who are afraid that the projections will force the University to dilute its standards.

The controversy has revolved around the semantic or real differences between "goals and timetables" required by HEW, and quotas, which seem to be unusually detested. The government has repeatedly stressed that these target figures are only "the measure or yardstick" to determine whether other affirmative action policies are achieving their goals of increasing the number of women and minorities in the workforce. An institution only has to show that it made "good faith efforts" to meet the goals which the institution itself drew up based on its own estimate of available candidates.

Several other groups have vehemently attacked this part of the affirmative action program, claiming that goals are no different than quotas, which, inforcing institutions to hire a specific number of certain kinds of people, undermines the merit system.

The American Jewish Congress, on behalf of several male academics, filed several charges this year with HEW of "reverse-discrimination." In December, Stanley Pottinger, director of the Office for Civil Rights under HEW, said that the affirmative action efforts for women and minorities were "losing ground" to a growing rhetorical backlash from male faculty members and administrators.

In Januray, 19 college presidents telegrammed President Nixon and new HEW secretary Casper Weinberger to "reaffirm their belief" in affirmative action as a means of eliminating discriminatory hiring patterns. Neither President Bok nor President Horner signed the telegram.

Bok said that the telegram was too brief to adequately argue his points. "I am constitutionally opposed to issuing one or two lines on complicated subjects," the former law school dean told The Crimson.

Instead, Bok sent Nixon and Weinberger a two-page letter supporting the program, but with reservations about the use of goals and timetables for faculty positions. Undoubtedly reflecting complaints he had received, Bok wrote, "It is extraordinarily difficult to develop a system of targets and goals that does not create an impression of imposing de facto quotas. This impression understandably creates grave misunderstandings among faculty and administrators concerned with maintaining high standards, junior faculty who are worried about their opportunities for promotion, and representatives of women and minority groups who feel betrayed if targets are not fully achieved."

Horner was supposed to have given a major address at the meeting of New England women professors and administrators at which the telegram was drafted, but missed it when her car broke down en route. She, too, wrote Nixon a letter supporting the program.

While women and minorities have made some gains in faculty and administrative areas, they are still clustered at the bottom of the job hierarchy. Particularly with respect to women, the University resembles a class structure divided along sexual lines. Women hold about less than 10 per cent of academic posts but make up close to 90 per cent of the clerical staff--the low-paid secretaries, typists, and stenographers.

Sexual stereotypes still exist--to which nearly every woman in the University can attest with at least one anecdote--and hurt women. A graduate student in math overheard a distinguished visiting professor seriously remark when he learned that there were eight women in the department: "But women can't do math."